WHAT IS THE IMAGE TO THE BEAST?
SOME of our readers as well as some of our contemporaries seem to have a wrong idea as to what is the image of Rev. 13:14, 15. Our correspondent writes that he knows "that Rome made it a law that Sunday, the first day of the week, was to be the Sabbath," but that "the real image of the beast is the cross." Others teach the same thing. Let us consider the prophecy. 1. It is assumed in this article, as it can easily be proved, that the beast of Rev. 13:1-10, which continued "forty and two months," refers to the Papacy. But when we say the Papacy we do not mean merely the Roman Catholic Church, nor that church as holding its temporal power over the States of the Church. The Roman Catholic Church as such has no power to persecute, while the beast is a persecutor. That church as possessing its temporal power over the States of the Church in Italy is too limited in scope and influence to be symbolized by the beast. What then does the beast symbolize? — It symbolizes the authority to define heresy and its punishment, given to Rome by the secular power and enforced by them according to her sentence. This power was given to Rome in A.D. 533, by Justinian, then emperor of Rome. The account of this, says Croly on the Apocalypse (pp. 167-171, second edition, 1828, London), "is to be found in the Annals of Baronius, vol. 7, p. 194, fol. Antwerpiæ." In Justinian's letter, addressed to "the most holy archbishop of our city of Rome, and patriarch," occurred the following statements:— Therefore we have made no delay in subjecting and uniting to your holiness all the priests of the whole East.
We cannot suffer that anything which relates to the state of the church, however manifest or unquestionable, should be moved without the knowledge of your Holiness, who are the HEAD OF ALL THE HOLY CHURCHES.
The letter also mentions that the incumbent of the rival see, the archbishop of Constantinople, was "desirous in all things to follow the apostolic authority of his Blessedness," the pope of Rome. The same year, March 25, in a letter to Epiphanius, Justinian refers to his letter to the bishop of Rome, and, says Croly, "repeats his decision, that all affairs touching the church shall be referred to the pope, 'HEAD OF ALL BISHOPS, AND THE TRUE AND EFFECTIVE CORRECTOR OF HERETICS.'" In the same month of the following year, the pope returned an answer repeating the language of the emperor, applauding the homage to the see, and adopting the titles of the imperial mandate. He observes that, among the virtues of Justinian, "one shines as a star, his reverence for the apostolic chair, to which he has subjected and united all the churches, it being truly the head of all, as was testified by the rules of the Fathers, the laws of princes, and the declarations of the emperor's piety." This letter of Justinian is not all the evidence of this action concerning the see of Rome. The 131st edict of the "Novellæ" of the Justinian code, on ecclesiastical titles and privileges, chapter 2, states:— We therefore decree that the most holy pope of the elder Rome is the first of all the priesthood. The archbishop of Constantinople was given second rank. The 9th edict states that in Rome "was the supremacy of the pontificate." But this decree of Justinian could not at once be carried out. The Arian Ostrogoths stood in the way of the trinitarian ambitious bishop of Rome. Justinian sent his army, under Belisarius, to suppress them, and they fell in A.D. 538, the last of the three kingdoms plucked up to make place for the little horn of Daniel 7, the "Head of all the Churches, and true and effective Corrector of Heretics." The forty and two months (1260 years) reached to 1798, when the power of the Papacy as a persecutor was destroyed, and the spiritual domination of the pope over the nations was no longer acknowledged. The beast then represented the Papacy as connected with the civil power, the church defining heresy and condemning heretics, and the civil power crystallizing into law the dogmas of the church and enforcing her decrees against heretics. It was a union of Church and State. 2. An image is a likeness, or resemblance. See where the same word is used in Rom. 8:29; 1 Cor. 11:7, and other scriptures. An "image to the beast" would, therefore, be a likeness to the beast, something resembling the beast. The beast does not look like the cross or any other figure. It was from the standpoint of the Church of Rome a union of religion with the State for the purpose of establishing the kingdom of Christ and punishing heresy, but from the standpoint of the prophecy it is the enthronement of self in the place of God, the setting up of antichrist, and the persecution of the people of God. The Papacy claimed in the Dark Ages that her object in the control she exercised over the civil power was to advance the kingdom of Christ. We know that it resulted in putting him to death myriads of times in the persons of his saints. The image will make the same claim, and do the same work. All this the image must do, for it is a likeness to the beast, and the image speaks and endeavors to put to death those who do not worship it. This a "cross" could not do, nor could any other material image. The Roman Catholic Church as a whole might worship the cross, others might follow them in that worship, but that would not be the image or likeness to the beast. But the "beast," a union of Church and State, could and did speak persecuting laws against the people of God, and caused them to be put to death; the image is also a union of Church and State, and it also will speak persecuting laws, and cause the people of God to be put to death. 3. The two-horned beast symbolizes this government, as was conclusively shown last week. And this government has already, in embyro, made the image to the beast. As has been shown over and over again in these columns, the Supreme Court, on February 29, 1892, decided that this was a religious people and Christian nation, and virtually affirmed the decision of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania that Christianity is a part of the common law. In the summer of 1892 the legislative department of this government committed itself to religious legislation at the demand of the churches in the Sunday closing of the World's Fair, and the executive signed the measure. He has not learned the lessons of history who asserts that this government will retrace these steps. It will not. It has yielded to the clamor of an apostate church, and in response to her dictation will go on her downward course till the image of the beast stands complete before us. 4. This government, declares the prophecy, "had power to give life unto the image of the beast," the union of Church and State, "and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed." Rev. 13:15. "Is it possible that in this government of equality and freedom such things can be?" asks a reader. — Yes, not only possible, but probable. When a government begins to legislate for God, or to put into statute law religious dogmas, those laws which pertain to God or religion naturally are considered the most important. He who violates such laws is considered the greatest criminal. He who works against them—and that is what the conscientious Christian would be compelled to819do—would be considered as a traitor to God and the government, and treason is punishable with death. This is what will be attempted in this country, and it will only be prevented by the interposition of God. The spirit of persecution of the dragon, which will be shown more fully, has been already manifest in the Sunday-law persecutions of the last few years. And Archbishop Ireland tells us (Catholic News, September 10, 1888) that "the violator of a Sunday law is the worst of criminals." The worst of criminals are punished with death. But, thanks be to God, the worship of the Creator is set over against the worship of the beast or his image. Reader, "worship Him." Rev. 14:7.